


Sheet Metal and a Blue Glow

by Astharoze



Category: RWBY
Genre: Gore, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-20
Updated: 2016-02-20
Packaged: 2018-05-22 01:01:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6064942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astharoze/pseuds/Astharoze
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There must be an engine inside him. Gears. Motors. Machine oil, wires, circuits. Qrow has seen bits and pieces, here and there, when James needs help realigning a plate or cleaning a hinge.</p>
<p>He makes a wish on the full moon he never has to see what’s under all that sheet metal.</p>
<p>Qrow Branwen should’ve remembered he has shit luck.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sheet Metal and a Blue Glow

**Author's Note:**

> Ayooo, I wanted to gift you guys with something sad and awful because I'm a bad person.  
> This isn't nearly the detail I'm going to go into in a longer fic, but it was satisfying for now.

Sheet Metal and Blue Glow

There are two thin blue lights on the front of James’ chest. There are two that match on his shoulder. And two more that match on the back of his hand. One night, the moon high in the sky and sending a plane of glowing white through the bedroom, Qrow wakes with his face still pillowed on James’ shoulder. The general is asleep, mouth parted gently and eyes closed gentler than Qrow thinks the man is capable of while still conscious. He’s peaceful and beautiful, and there’s a quiet whir coming from the plates of silver that make up the right side of his chest.

He’s warm. Warm enough to keep the metal from being cool, kicking off heat like a furnace, keeping Qrow warm with the window open, keeping the bed they share comfortable and safe. It’s the most content he’s felt in ages. 

The huntsman spends a long moment watching those little blue slats of light. They glow in time with his breathing, they hum along with the rise and fall of his chest. There must be an engine inside him. Gears. Motors. Machine oil, wires, circuits. Qrow has seen bits and pieces, here and there, when James needs help realigning a plate or cleaning a hinge.

He makes a wish on the full moon he never has to see what’s under all that sheet metal.

Qrow Branwen should’ve remembered he has shit luck.

There’s screaming, but there’s always screaming. There’s the crunch of concrete and metal, a small city hours out from Vale’s capital being evacuated. It’s music in Qrow’s head, a harmony for him to follow along to as he swings his scythe in an arc around his body, dances after a nevermore as it screeches at him. It doesn’t anticipate how high he can jump, how strong his body is, and maybe Qrow’s always been a little overconfident but he makes up for it. By being a total and utter badass, of course. 

Being a huntsman takes more than skill and talent-- it takes training. He’s learned to filter out important noises- the rumble of something larger than a beowulf, the sound of his scroll in his pocket. He feels it buzz in his chest and makes his way towards the meeting point-- a fountain near the middle of the township. He leads a few wolves there, dispatches them easily, and finds...nothing. Nothing around him. Nobody. He finally checks the message on his scroll and feels his blood run like ice. A location marker. Three letters. SOS. 

It’s from James. Qrow thinks his heart is going to explode as he uses his scythe to scale the face of a building, slamming into the concrete at the top to run across roofs. He has to force himself to remember not to hold his breath, has to keep air in his lungs so he can move. There’s a drop and a crater in the concrete and that has to be from Ironwood, half metal like a walking steel beam. 

There is no need to pause, to consider, before he drops himself right down the crater to the subfloor beneath, the sewer James is lying in, the scattered bits of dust and dirt that were once a Grimm. Shattered by James. James was shattered in return.

He hears a clicking sound, a hissing, angry buzz. It makes him feel sick to his stomach before he’s had a chance to see. Just the sound is gut-wrenching, pulling up bile in his throat. The sounds grow more horrifying as he holds up his scroll to see in the dim air: a heavy metallic clunk. A shuddering whir of a motor trying its best-- the sick and weak snap and ping of the fan catching on metal and halting in its tracks.

He has to think of them in parts or he’ll think of them as Jimmy.

When he finally sees that dim blue glow, it’s brighter than usual. The metal casing that makes up James’ chest is torn open. Years of training-- the same training that made him a huntsman, the same training that made him a weapon-- are what keep Qrow from vomitting. He’s seen a human sliced open by Grimm before. He tries to remember that, over this-- because this is James. They came here to protect civilians-- an army battalion and a few huntsman, just a routine scouting mission. They came here to protect. And now James is torn to shreds. 

His entire goddamn leg is torn off. He can’t see it anywhere-- no glint of metal, no shine of steel or blue glow. The right arm is-- broken, bent in a way that makes Qrow wince as he gets an arm under James’ head, starts fucking screaming his name. He can’t focus on the ways he’s broken, not yet, he has to get them help and get them out. He hears someone above him, his own hand flying over Ironwood’s chest to unclasp the tight collar and tie so the man can -breathe-. He realizes why he’s done that- he’s only using one lung. The other’s ripped open, synthetic organ crushed with the force it took to rip the metal plating off. 

What hurts Qrow the worst is the way James’ eyes are open. They’re staring at him, mouth parted to pant for gasping breaths in a way that makes Qrow’s chest ache instead of burn. The sheets of steel and iron are torn so neatly from his chest, ripping old scars open. There are three broad, deadly claw marks mangling his side, ripping wire and circuits to a useless pile of metal and blue gel that glows visceral and undead. He combs the general’s hair back and wants to tell him he’ll be alright, but he’s speechless. He’s useless. He can build a weapon. He can’t build a person.

So what good is he?

Someone pulls him away, there’s a spotlight above them. The searing pain in his arm is more than just a hand holding him back, it’s Glynda, she’s holding him away so they can take James away from him. Up-- into the light from the ship, and he knows he’s in shock for how long it takes him to realize they’re saving Ironwood’s damn life. 

They don’t let him on the ship.

They don’t let him in the room. He’s not family. It takes a week for him to wake up. The doctor says something cheerful to Qrow about how no biological part of his body was damaged-- all in all it was a simple repair. 

Qrow is caught between decking the man for saying it was simple and retching at using the word ‘repair’ on a human being. On James Ironwood. On Jimmy.

He locks the door behind himself and crawls into James’ bed without a word. There are heavy black bandages covering the seams, wrapped around his torso, covering his beautiful blue glow. There are stitches on his skin. There are bruises on his jaw, and when James realizes Qrow is settling in beside him, a smile on his face. “Don’t you ever do that again,” the huntsman hisses, and that’s all the discussion there is on the matter.

 

They don’t let Ironwood leave the infirmary for two weeks, despite the fact that he’s walking again in three days. Qrow can’t decide if he hates it or not. He resolves himself to not hate it. Being a cyborg is keeping James alive in the worst of it, for all it puts him there in the first place. And isn’t that what they all do? Step out in front of the bullet so the rest of Remnant doesn’t have to?

Two nights is all it takes for him to have nightmares about it, about James’ eyes going dark in his arms, about James’ body torn in parts and glowing blue and painted red. He jolts awake, sitting up with a lurch of his body and his stomach and his mind, can’t breathe. He’s suffocating. 

James’ arm moves from his waist, the heavy metal weight letting him breathe. He mumbles sleepy, adorable apologies, unaware. Unaware of how it’s eating Qrow’s insides out, how it’s tearing him apart that he can’t keep this from happening again. And again. And again, as many times as they need to save the whole damn world.

There’s nothing to do for it. He’s not the man to change the world. He just stands beside the ones that do. Fitting his arm around James, he presses him down into the blankets and covers his human half with his whole body. If nothing else, he can try.


End file.
